Runaway
by liberifatali8
Summary: Melau is a 13-year-old London girl who runs away from her horrible parents and mistakenly goes through the platform 9 34 barrier and finds out she's a witch! Life could be worse, right?


NOTE: I know in the second book, Harry & Ron DON'T get to Hogwarts by train....just imagine the whole 'car' thing never happened okay people? ^^; THANK YOU GUYS! This is my first HP fic...and I PROMISE you'll get to find out why Melau was running from her parents. XD  
  
Runaway Chapter I - Medieval Torture Chamber...NOT!  
  
...Melau didn't look back. She tried to avoid the stares of people and the curses of her parents. She took a flying leap over two baggage carts, a cat, and a old book, and stopped in front of a thin brick wall between the Platforms 9 and 10. Time seemed to pass a little slower. She knew it was something she had forgotten - but what? She looked anxiously around the busy Kings Cross Station, where a few strange poeple were holding owls. Then, where time finally caught up to her, she realized it. '..I don't have a train ticket...'  
  
Ignoring her feelings, she looked behind her, through the busy crowds. Her parents were catching up, ready to aim for her. Her legs moved before her brain, unfortunatley, and she had had forgotten that she was straight away in front of a small brick wall, and ran. She ran and knew, somehow, whether it be a strange premonition or a perception or even just mere coincidence, she was going to end up somewhere. And, unknowningly, she was right, because she ran immediatley through the barrier for Platform 9 and three quarters, and found herself in front of the Hogwarts train. She fell on her face from sheer shock - running through a brick wall, and all - and a redhead boy who looked to be about 13 or so, asked her if she needed help up, which she refused probably a little more rudely than she would have liked, and got up herself.  
  
She stood, slightly frozen for perhaps only a few seconds, but frozen nonetheless, at the sight. People were rushing about, stuffing loads and loads of suitcases and owl cages onto a special train compartment, and piling into the train. A young girl was saying goodbye to her brothers, at least, she assumed they were her brothers, because they all looked almost perfectly alike - red hair, freckles, and dressed in home-knitted sweaters. A lot people were wearing strange robes, parchments and toads, and muttering things about 'muggles' and 'magic'. Her common sense tried to tell her she was wrong about the last part, but she had no time to think, because exactly at that moment, the train conductor called 'All aboard!' and she instinctivley followed everyone else, onto the Hogwarts train.  
  
~~~ Melau's POV ~~~  
  
To say it was cool, strange, and exciting would be a complete understatement. I normally would have been overjoyed at the actual possibility of escaping my parents, getting on a train without a ticket, and be going somewhere I likely have never been before, in a very-cool looking compartment with some cool-looking pets and some really cute boys, but today was certainly not ordinary. It must be my lucky day today or something,I thought while picking up a strange-looking stick. A few sparks came out and I stuffed it in my pocket to look around.  
  
A very odd-looking woman was selling candies on a pushcart; Bernie Botts every-flavor jelly beans, chocolate frogs, pumpkin pasties - uggh, I HATE pumpkin. But anyway I was hungry, so I ran over to the cart.  
  
"How much are the jelly beans?" I asked with perhaps a little too much shyness. She handed me a package."Two Knuts a pack."  
  
"Two WHAT?" I said, jumping, more than a little suprised. Maybe this WASN'T my lucky day...I tried to hand her some fifty-cent pieces but she gave me a strange look. "Muggle money?" She inquired, staring at me with a odd look. "Sorry, hon." She pushed the cart into the next chamber. I sat down in one of the train seats, a bit angry. What was 'muggle' anyway? What had I gotten myself into? I sighed as I leaned forward a bit to watch the scenery. Mountains, rolling hills, puffy clouds, bla bla bla, nothing I haven't seen before. I sighed again and flopped my head into my hands as I watched a toad hop by my seat.  
  
"Anyone sitting here?" said a male voice. I didn't bother to look up. "No, go ahead." I felt somone sit down next to me and I must have looked really, really worried, because he said "First year, huh? Don't worry. It won't so bad."  
  
This inspired a new wave of thought. What was a 'First year'? Why would it be bad? Did I have a one-way ride to a medieval torture chamber castle where we are forced to return every year or face a Master's wrath? Would I have to cook? I HATE cooking. And why was everyone carrying owls and why was someone chasing a GOD DAMNED TOAD?! I ignored those questions and decided on a less, er, profane question. Without looking up, I asked, "Where's this train going?"  
  
I could sense whoever he was was stunned. I hoped I didn't ask anything totally wrong. He must have been reading my thoughts or something, because he said, "It's OK, It's just, I thought, since you got the letter...Well, anyway, we're going to Hogwarts, and it's my second year."  
  
'A-ha! Hogwarts! That helped a LOT....what IS Hogwarts? A pig farm? ' I pushed the thought out of my mind. Pig farming is way up there on the list with cooking. I decided to at least pretend I knew what he knew I knew I didn't know.  
  
"Oh." I looked up - third big mistake of the day. I found myself looking into a beuatiful pair of shining emerald eyes, amazing eyes, the kind you could just drown yourself in.... I mentally hit myself, and looked away because I could feel myself going red... 'Subject Change.', The little voice in my head told me, and I knew it wasn't a suggestion.  
  
"My name is Melau, by the way...Melau LeeAnn Esther DeAnita. It takes up two lines on my birth certificate...I don't know what my mother was thinking, you know. I mean, 'Melau LeeAnn Esther'... Whenever she's angry, she says my full name, and she always takes a deep breath before saying it, which is the main reason why I forget the 'LeeAnn Esther DeAnita' and really, really wish people would call me Melau instead of Melly, because the mean kids at school do that and KNOW I don't like it, but one time, I told them to shut up forever, when I was really, really angry, and somehow their mouths sealed shut and had to go in for surgery, and now, they don't call me 'Melly' but I don't have any freinds now because they all think I'll go crazy and kill them all."  
  
I suddenly realized I probably said too much.  
  
"My name is Harry Potter, and....I guess that's it."  
  
I smiled because I really didn't have anything more I could say without falling off my seat from embarrasment.  
  
"And," he continued from nothing, "I lived in a cupboard under the stairs, And when anything strange happened, that no one could explain, I got blamed. And then they locked me in my cupboard. And, my Aunt Petunia, she used to give me horrible haircuts, and I got angry, and my hair would always grow back overnight."  
  
I gaped, incredolous. "They...locked you....in a cupboard?!"  
  
He smiled and I couldn't understand why. "And last year, I found out about my parents, and that I was a wizard, and I got to scare them all summer."  
  
I was about to ask what he meant by 'wizard', but the train semiconductor announced, 'We will be leaving to Hogwarts in five minutes. Please leave all luggage on the train - it will be taken to the school seperately.'  
  
"I have to change into my school robes now. See you at Hogwarts!" He said, going into another cabin.  
  
So, Hogwarts is a school...but what about the owls? The 'wizard' thing? He couldn't mean.... I ignored yet another thought as I saw a set of robes similar to the ones I saw some people wearing outside of the train. I decided it would be best if I put them on - to blend in, and of course, later, to find out who Harry Potter was and what he meant by wizard, and of course where to get the owls.  
  
It was going to be a loooong train ride..... 


End file.
